Neal, Joseph M., Jr White, Claytee D

Description

Part of an interview with Senator Joe Neal by Claytee White on February 7, 2006. Neal discusses his early work in the Nevada Legislature, including his support for restoring rights to felons and his opposition to capital punishment.Could you tell me about some of the early ones in the early 70s? Well, the issues that I dealt with in the early 70s, first of all, were issues on capital punishment. I took a position against capital punishment and will always take a position against capital punishment. Up until I retired, I never did support capital punishment. I was always opposed to it. The other issue that I dealt with was to restore rights to ex-felons. That was one of the first bills that I actually passed in the legislature. That was in 1973. That bill was something else. I introduced a bill. It came to me through a guy that I met. His name was Butler. And Butler was from Tallulah. He had come here and he had become a felon. He was shining shoes, and I was getting my shoes shined one day. And he said to me, "What needs to be done is to get these ex-felons some rights. We can't get a job. We can't do nothing." So I said, "Well, okay." So when I got elected, the first thing I introduced was this bill i

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University of Nevada, Las Vegas, University Libraries

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Mountain West Digital Library